Follow of the week: an archive of Soviet misfits

@soviethool is the Instagram account from the Soviet Hooligans project, which is in the process of producing a book on youth subcultures in the Soviet Union during perestroika.

A post shared by Soviethool (@soviethool) on Jan 29, 2017 at 6:52am PST

Misha Baster, the curator of Soviet Hooligans, has said in interviews that the project is approaching the word “hooligans” broadly, including in the term a wide range of new subcultures and youth movements that didn’t benefit from Party support: from football fans and fashionistas to rockers, punks, and break-dancers. The Instagram account features pictures from cult Soviet photographers and from people’s personal archives in order to chronicle a part of recent history that risks being forgotten in favour of political events.

The project also crowdfunded an e-book in Russian, available as an app or on the project’s website.